My favourite crime programme on tv - New Zealand's Brokenwood Mysteries

Brokenwood (pop c5000) was a fictional town on New Zealand's North Island, only 20 ks from the coast. The show was filmed in Warkworth which doubles as Brokenwood, although many rural towns on the North Island past Auck­land were similar. Broken­wood Pol­ice Station is a 1911 building that was built as Helens­ville Post Office.

L->R: Dr Gina Kadinsky, Detectives Mike Shepherd, Kristin Sims and Sam Breen

womanaroundtown

So why was Detective Inspector Mike Shepherd/Neill Rea sent from big Auckland to tiny Brokenwood? With a possible murder investigation underway that might have linked a victim and a local police officer, Shepherd had to come in and take over the investigation from local officers, to their displeasure. And his singlehanded approach to crime solving affected most of the Brokenwood force badly. The fact that the earlier investigation into the dead man's wife's death was probably botched didn't win him any new friends.

After the investigation, Shepherd re­assessed his life and decided to stay on indefinitely, even though it meant a demotion to Detective Senior Sergeant. In this quiet country town Shepherd, with his uncon­ventional approach to police work, was assisted in solving murders by the very bright local Detective Kris­tin Sims/Fern Suth­er­land. In time, the working rel­ation­ship between the two moved from tricky to solid as they began to appreciate each other's talents. As did the third member of the team, DC Sam Breen/Nic Sampson.

Brokenwood was in a farming region, with wheat crops and wine, in an area that was home to many people escaping big city bustle. The small town feel was really noticeable. And for me it was helpful that Broken­wood cases tended to involve a victim involved in a specific activity con­nected to their death eg sky­diver, winemaker or honey producer.

Note that the beautiful New Zealand scenery was always gorg­eous. The cameras maximised the rural beauty.

Detective Mike Shepherd drives a 1971 Holden Kingswood.

NZHerald

Jared Morehu sharing local knowledge with Detective Sheppard

Mike Sheppard always drove a classic car. And he always loved country music, so whenever he was in his car, everyone could hear the country music playing loudly. In fact his love of US country and western music was his clear character issue. The viewer knows that Shepherd had been married and div­orc­ed a few times – perhaps his wives hadn’t shared his musical tastes. But over the series, the char­acters' private liv­es were not often discussed. The chemistry between the dif­f­erent characters was important, and private information may not have helped. 

For years I’ve been a fan of Mid Summer Murders and was keen to see other fans finding a link with Brokenwood, albeit with a different acc­ent. Simply replace the English count­ies with rural New Zealand towns. Two examples: 1] like Chief Inspector Barnaby, Shepp­ard didn't have a gun. And 2] Shepherd gave people a break when he could. So this series was set in a country that was familiar and different.

Brokenwood had a number of regularly recurring supporting characters, witnesses or participants from one episode might be brought back in later epis­odes. Set in a smallish town, the detectives knew many locals, giv­ing viewers a sense of an ongoing community. 

And there were very inter­esting minor characters that kept the local comm­unity involved eg Jared Morehu/Pana Hema Tay­lor, whose good-natured, nat­ural acting helped give the show its warm­th. Also the serious but quirky­ pathologist Dr Gina Kadinsky/Cristina Serban Ionda; she sounded like a slightly sad medical bureaucrat from somewhere in the step­p­es. Ionda pl­ayed a smallish role in each episode but it was always funny when she told the others how things were better or different back in Rus­sia. Mike was wrong about all murder suspects and methods, said the Russian, about a man on whom she had romantic dreams.

Broken­wood Pol­ice Station

normally the Helens­ville Post Office

Rural scenes in Riverhead, filmed for Brokenwood Mysteries 

Brokenwood Mysteries Filming Locations 

Clever scripts full of ironic one-liners and retorts came from the Kiwi act­ors who delivered them well. While Mike was a solid and reliab­le character, his two detectives provided self-effacing, slightly irrever­ent humour. Brokenwood was not a riveting or intense drama with horr­if­ic forensic details, nor did it depict sordid tales of police corr­uption. Thankfully it was a crime series that emphasised small town characters, unique New Zealand life­style and Kiwi irony.

So my conclusion? Amongst those things that set Brokenwood apart were the unique New Zea­land culture, beautiful landscape, realistic characters, believable plots and dry humour. Yes a small town in a safe country could not have been a venue of such freq­uent felonies, and the detectives were­n't Einstein brilliant. But never mind.